I left my comfy hostel at eight o’clock in the morning after I tried to sneak out silently and not wake up the others.
It was not raining when I left, but started shortly after. Today was the third day of three that I had to go a bit longer than originally planned in order to be one day ahead of my original schedule. So I had 120 kilometres on my to-do list today.
I took my first break after 35 kilometres at the camping site I had originally planned to stay at. Then I had a lunch break in the middle of nowhere after 70 kilometres and a nice cake and hit chocolate break at the Mount Robson information centre after 85 kilometres.
When I arrived in Valemount, today’s destination, it was partly sunny, partly raining. Since the forecast was really bad, I decided to book a B&B instead of staying on a campsite. But finally, there wasn’t any more rain so far and it doesn’t look like there will be any tonight. So I could have saved the money.
Anyway, the destination tomorrow is Blue River. And I’m afraid it will be an even deader nest than this one.
Where rabbit and hedgehog say goodnight to each other (German saying): Valemount, BC
Today was my last day on the Icefields Parkway and in Jasper National Park. I left the Icefield campground at 8:30 and had a long (105 km), but rather easy ride to Jasper, which is at an elevation of 1060 metres, so almost 1000 metres below my starting point.
What made today’s ride less pleasant, were the weather conditions. First it was six degrees cold – so I started cycling with my thin down jacket on. Then, a bit earlier than expected, it started raining at 11:30. So I had some cold 50k before lunch and some cold and wet 50k after lunch.
I passed some nice waterfalls on the way and saw some mountain goats. After six hours, completely soaked, I reached Jasper. Due to the rain, I booked a hostel bed for tonight. The hostel is brand new, so it’s a nice accommodation.
Since the forecast for the next days is bad as well, I have tried to book cabins and other solid roofs over my head for the coming days. Tomorrow will be a long day – 120 kilometres to Valemount. Fingers crossed that it won’t be raining all the time.
Today was my first day over 100 kilometres. And it included two passes over 2000 metres. So to start from the end, the beef tenderloin that I just had together with the red wine from British Columbia (I didn’t even know that was a thing) at the Icefield Centre at the Columbia Icefield tasted delicious.
Back at the Mosquito Creek hostel it rained during the night. My weather forecast had predicted sun from 6 AM, but it was still cloudy in the morning and very chilly – only six degrees.
Right after the start, the road gained elevation until I reached the highest point of today (and maybe the whole trip?), Bow Pass at 2067 metres. Bow Lake was located nearby and was pretty picturesque, but nothing compared to Peyto Lake which I reached a bit later after a little detour from the main route and a ten minutes’ hike. Peyto Lake has a beautiful turquoise colour and can be seen from a viewpoint high above the lake.
From there I had a long, mainly downhill ride to the Saskatchewan river crossing, the only petrol station/restaurant on the Icefields Parkway. I had some dirty fish and chips for lunch before I continued for the second 50k of the day.
These were much tougher than the first because now I had to climb up again to 2000 metres. It was a spectacular ride though, so I stopped several times for photos. I also stopped for a bear – the second black bear of this trip. It crossed the road fifty metres ahead of me. Cars were stopping. But by the time I had started my GoPro camera, it had disappeared into the bushes. I had another close encounter earlier today, but I never got to see that pal. I just saw his big wet paw prints on the dry, warm pavement – it must have crossed the road a minute before.
After six and a half hours cycling, I finally crossed the Sunwapta pass (2030 m) at the boundary between Banff and Jasper National Parks. From there it was an easy ride to my campground for today which is located at the Columbia Icefield. The place is a bit touristy, but the food was excellent. And so are the liquid carbohydrates that I need for my trip to Jasper tomorrow.
Since the weather forecast predicted rain today in the afternoon, I woke up early and made sure to leave Banff at eight o’clock in the morning.
The route today took me further into Banff National Park. The first part of the route was the Bow Valley Parkway from Banff to Lake Louise. I had my bear spray in the back pocket of my jersey today – just in case. And indeed after half an hour I spotted the first bear. There were cars stopping at the side of the road, which is always a sign for wildlife nearby. And there was a black bear walking further up on the hill maybe 200 metres from us.
So early in the morning, there wasn’t much traffic. So I took a look over my shoulder several times today when there were no cars at all.
I stopped for lunch in Lake Louise and then entered the highlight of the trip: the Icefields Parkway which is a 230 kilometres long scenic route between Lake Louise and Jasper. At the start of the road, there were little booths where they checked whether I had a park permit. The lady in the booth saw my bear spray and said: “Oh, you’ve got bear spray. Good! Lots of bears on the parkway.” That was reassuring…
The route was now leading higher into the mountains. The last thirty kilometres were constantly uphill, reaching 1800 metres finally. After 90 kilometres, I reached my goal today, Mosquito Creek, at 2:30. There is a campsite and a hostel here. Due to the heavy rain which was predicted for tonight, I asked to stay in the hostel. It started indeed raining one hour after I arrived here. So I think that was a good call.
Tomorrow, depending on the weather, I will either have a shorter trip to Rampart Creek. Or, if it doesn’t rain, I might actually continue and go 100 kilometres in total to Wilcox Pass, which is 2000 metres high. That would allow me to reach Jasper the day after and give me one more buffer day for the rest of the trip.
Since I still had a bit of a jet lag, I went to bed a eight last night. My tent was pretty close to the highway, so I could hear the traffic passing by all the time. At 9:30 I woke up from some screaming, so I thought first there was a car full of drunk party girls driving by. Then I realised, it’s more a howling than a screaming, and it doesn’t sound human. So I had to get out of my sleeping bag, open the tent zipper and stick my head out, and there were two coyotes 20-30 metres away from my tent. I was too scared to get out my camera, so I just went back into my tent and hoped they never noticed me. They did that howling thing a couple of more times during the night, but seemed to never get closer to my tent.
I woke up at seven, which means I added eleven hours of sleep to the ten hours the night before. So I guess the jet lag is officially over now.
Fortunately, the sun was still shining and there was no wind today. So I had a wonderful ride to Banff. Roughly seventy kilometres through beautiful nature.
The campsites were fully booked when I arrived here. So I checked in at a hostel instead. They have a bar and a happy hour, so I’m fine for the moment. Gotta get some food soon.
Tomorrow it’s Canada Day. That’s why all the places are booked out. My plan is to climb higher in Banff National Park and stay on a camping ground 90 kilometres from here. It’s a first come first serve place, so I really hope it won’t be full when I get there. Because I don’t really have a plan B. Stay tuned!
Picture of a coyote – not mine, Wikipedia’s
I pimped my steering bad – have different motives for different moods
Car drivers have been very considerate so far – despite their obscenely big pickups
Nansen and I are on the road again. That means in this case another bike holiday. This time I’m planning to cycle from Calgary to Vancouver, through Banff and Jasper National Park, which should be around 1300 kilometres in total and take me around two weeks.
I arrived in Calgary on Friday and spent only one day there. My plan landed at 1:30. At the airport, I had planned to assemble my bike, pack everything in my bike bags and send the cardboard box with the things I didn’t need on my trip to Vancouver, so that I can use the same box on my return flight.
Coming out from the baggage hall, I was greeted by some very friendly older gentlemen with cowboy hats who are there volunteering to help the tourists. They told me where I could find the UPS store which I had found on Google. So I went there and just made sure that they could send the box at all (because it’s huge). And then I started unpacking the box and reassembling my bike. All in all, that took me a bit more than one hour, which means everything went very smoothly. Then I went back to the UPS guy and paid for the transport, which was finally much more than he had estimated before, but still OK given that I won’t have the stress to find a new box in Vancouver during the weekend I’m planning to stay there.
From the airport, I took a bus to the city centre – with my bike on a rack in front of the bus. I was very lucky with the place where I stayed, Hotel Arts, which was affordable, yet very fancy. A friend of a friend joined me for dinner. I was recommended to take Poutine, a Canadian specialty, but played safe with fish & chips in the end. The plan was originally to go out for some beers, but at ten o’clock (six in the morning Norwegian time), my lights went out and I returned to my hotel.
The next morning I had to return the Mountain Equipment Coop store to get my bear defence spray which I didn’t get the night before because I hadn’t known that I needed an ID. (Mr. Nansen was very upset that I got the spray.)
After packing all my stuff at the hotel, I finally left for my first bike day. In order to avoid the downtown traffic, I took a tram to the Northwest suburbs. I started cycling at eleven and had planned to go to Ghost Lake initially. However, I considered now to go all the way to Banff on my first day after all in order to have one more buffer day in case of bad weather or other unforeseen circumstances. The trip to Banff would have been 130 kilometres though which would have been very hard on the first day, especially given the fact that I have hardly cycled this spring and my longest trip so far this season was 50 kilometres. In addition, it turned out that I had very strong headwinds. The area west of Calgary is still a great plain where the west wind isn’t stopped by anything. So I was struggling hard today and often couldn’t go faster than 10 km/h in flat areas. So Banff wasn’t an option finally, and I went to Ghost Lake only (51 km), which was tough enough.
Arriving there, I passed by a camping site which I thought was not the one I wanted to stay at. So I continued, but unfortunately, there came never another one. So I was a bit uncertain what to do because I didn’t want to go back, and there wasn’t any other campsite or other accommodation anywhere near by. So I finally just set up my tent at a parking space near the highway around five kilometres beyond Ghost Lake.
The wind seems to get less now in the evening, so I hope for better conditions during my ride to Banff tomorrow, which will include some climbing. It’s 7:30 now and I’m very tired already. So I’ll probably sleep early and get up early in the morning.
Calgary (not my pic – didn’t have time to go on a photo safari)
Done with the bike assembling
Selfie in the morning
My first campsite (wait til you hear about the coyotes in the next blog post)
Today is our last day in Greenland. We spent the last three days in Ilulissat which is located at the Kangia Icefjord which is famous for its many icebergs.
On Wednesday, we went for a hike along this fjord. We were very lucky at the end of this hike to observe a group of humpback whales from a very short distance. This group has apparently been at this spot every day for a while because there seems to be a lot of krill for them to eat there. We sat there for about an hour, watched them and took pictures and videos.
In the evening, we went on a midnight boat trip to see the icebergs in the midnight sun. Unfortunately, it was a bit cloudy and rainy. So the icebergs were not as picturesque as they could have been. We did see the same group of whales again, however, and it was a nice tour anyway.
Yesterday, we went on a boat trip to a settlement called Ilimanaq. Ilimanaq is located just south of the icefjord. It takes normally around thirty minutes by boat from Ilulissat, but yesterday due to the wind and streaming conditions, there was so much and dense ice in the fjord that it took us two and a half hours to get there. Only forty-eight people live in Ilimanaq. Most of them live of fishing. They have a school there in which pupils from six to fourteen years are taught by one teacher all in the same classroom.
Today, we had to check out of our hotel at ten o’clock. Our flight first leaves in the evening, so we have plenty of time today. Unfortunately, it is rainy outside, so I’m spending time in a café today updating my blog. It was a beautiful trip here in Greenland once again. Now I’m looking forward to coming back to the Norwegian summer.
We have spent the last three days in Qeqertarsuaq which is a village with 850 inhabitants on the island with the same name in Greenlandic, in English Disko Island.
We were exceptionally lucky with the weather here and had two very sunny days. Today, it’s a bit cloudy, but still fine.
Qeqertarsuaq has a beautiful beach with icebergs floating in the bay right in front. This was our first stop when we arrived on Sunday. Later we went to a viewpoint called Udkiggen to spot some whales, but we weren’t lucky this time.
Yesterday, we hiked up the the glacier Lyngmarkbreen which lies 900 metres above the village. They arrange dogsled tours for tourists up there in the summer, and the dogs stay on the snow. So we had a chance to say hello to them. They were unexpectedly shy though, not like the sled dogs I know from Svalbard. The view from up there was stunning. So it was definitely worth walking up all the way.
Today, we went for a hike on the east side of the village, first to a little waterfall and then to some basalt rock formations.
Now I’m sitting in the Blue Café – the only café here. There is only one place to have dinner here as well which is at the hotel. The dinner was quite good though – I had reindeer twice. I’m still looking forward to some more variety in terms of cafés and restaurants on our next and final stop on this trip, Ilulissat. Our boat there will leave at six o’clock, which is in two and a half hours. We will arrive there at eight and spend another three days there before we return to Norway.
Hello from Sisimiut in West Greenland! We arrived here yesterday after hiking the Arctic Circle Trail from Kangerlussuaq for eight days. This was my second time hiking this 150 kilometres long trail, this time guiding for Bergans Adventures.
We were a small group of three. Marit and Arild had booked the trip through Bergans. There are very few hikers who walk the trail, so we hardly met any other people on the way. There are huts in a day walk’s distance on the trail – most of them very small, some a bit bigger. I stayed in huts four of the nights and in my tent for four nights.
The first night, we met Fabian, another German hiker who walked the same direction. And the third night, we met Valerie and David. All of them were on the same schedule then as us. We didn’t walk together during the day, but we met again in the afternoons so that we could spend the evenings and have dinner together and play a game of dice.
We were fairly lucky with the weather this year. It was overcast with a bit of rain the first day, then five very nice days – sunny and pretty warm, up to twenty degrees – and finally two rainy and cold days in the end. On our last day yesterday, we even had snow above 300 metres. The disadvantage with the nice weather was the millions of hungry mosquitoes. Luckily, a mosquito net over the head and long clothes provide good enough protection against them.
We were also lucky with the wildlife. Already on the first day, we spotted a family of musk oxen pretty close. They are massive and impressive animals – fascinating to watch from a distance and a bit scary when they move or run into your direction. We saw a lot of reindeer – one of them not scared at all and coming very close at the second hut, the canoe centre. Snow-white mountain hares crossed our way on several days, a pair of eagles circled above our heads one day. We saw an arctic fox with a ptarmigan in its mouth from our hut the fourth day, and two living ptarmigans the next day.
Today, we are enjoying a relaxing rest day in Sisimiut, the second biggest “town” in Greenland with 4000 inhabitants. It was terrible weather when we arrived yesterday, but today the sun is shining and Sisimiut is presenting itself from its best side with small colourful houses and beautiful surroundings with snow-covered mountains and the sea.
Tonight, we will take a boat which will bring us further north – first to Qeqertarsuaq on Disko Island where we will spend two nights. On Tuesday, we will continue to Ilulissat where we are going to spend another three nights. We hope to spot some whales and are looking forward to seeing icebergs when we get there.
On our last day today we only had a short distance to cover. Since we stayed out late on the music festival yesterday as well, we had a very relaxed morning and didn’t start cycling before eleven o’clock.
The first few kilometres from Honningsvåg were flat until we came to a big camping site. From there a winding road took us up to 300 metres. We thought that there would be a plateau and that the road to Nordkapp would be rather flat, but that was not the case. We rode downhill almost back to sea level again and had a constant up and down until we reached the final ascent to the North Cape.
We reached Nordkapp at two o’clock. Here we took some photos, opened a bottle of sparkling wine and had reindeer stew for lunch. We wanted to take a bus back to Honningsvåg. They only go a few times per day, so we had enough time to relax and took a bus back at five.
Today we stay at a hostel which looks like it was a hospital before. We enjoyed dinner at the same restaurant as yesterday, and I am back now at the Oggasjakka festival while Wolf went back to the hostel. Our ship leaves at 5:45 tomorrow, so it will be a short night.
Leaving Honningsvåg behind and below us
And all the roads we have to walk are winding
Beautiful landscape on the last kilometres
Good mood on the last day
Close to the finish line
View from Nordkapp
Exhausted and happy – from left to right: Wolf, Stephan and Mr. Nansen
